


Discovery

by GemmaRose



Series: One Piece Magic AU [5]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Canon-Typical Violence, Fire, Gen, Injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 10:53:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6981406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GemmaRose/pseuds/GemmaRose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cornered in the flaming Grey Terminal, Ace finally discovers his affinity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Discovery

Ace coughed, eyes watering as he looked around. The flames had consumed every familiar landmark of the Grey Terminal, turning it into a hellscape where he couldn’t even tell which way lead to the sea.

“Do you think the dump folks got away?” Luffy asked, and if they hadn’t been in very real danger of getting burnt alive Ace might’ve been proud of his little brother for taking the time to spare a thought for someone else.

“There’s no time to worry about anyone else.” he snapped, clutching his steel pipe tighter in one hand and bringing the other up to cover his mouth with his forearm. “Damn it, I can’t even tell where we are!”

“Who said you brats could run away?” Bluejam’s voice rang across the burning piles of garbage, and Luffy turned to face the bastard first.

“Go away, Bluejam!” he yelled, charisma magic ringing in his words. Ace felt a brief surge of pride for his dumb little brother, so powerful even if he couldn’t use his magic on purpose yet. The asshole stepped forward deliberately, and Ace grabbed Luffy by the arm to drag behind him. It was only a small protection against an animator like Bluejam, but if any one of those floating swords made a stab at Luffy he’d gladly put himself in its way.

“You’re the ones who started the fire, so what are you doing here?” Ace asked, drawing all eyes back to him. “I thought you’d long since escaped.”

“Shut up, brat!” one of Bluejam’s swords lunged forwards on its own, catching Ace on the shoulder before retreating to its position over the bastard’s shoulder. His blood was even redder than usual in the light of the flames. Bluejam started to monologue, and Ace re-tightened his grip on his pipe.

“Luffy, let’s go!” he whirled on his heel and started running, Luffy just a pace or two ahead on his left. He had to get Luffy out of here, at the very least. Luffy didn’t have the blood of a demon, he didn’t deserve to die like this.

“Don’t let them get away!” Bluejam ordered, and Ace saw two figures materialize out of nowhere. Illusionists, damn!

Luffy cried out, and Ace’s breath caught in his screaming throat as he registered a blur of silver movement. He lunged sideways, dodging the first magically animated sword and knocking Luffy clear of the second. The blade intended for the backs of Luffy’s knees bit into his side instead, and Ace yelled in pain as Bluejam drew his weapons back.

“We worked together, so now we’re going to die together.” the bastard said almost calmly. Ace scrambled to his feet, and bared his teeth in a snarl at the man who tried to grab Luffy. He helped his little brother up, and held himself tall as they were encircled by Bluejam’s men.

“You never told me where your treasure was hidden.” Bluejam smiled, a sick thing that made Ace want to smash his stupid face in. Well, made him want to do that _more_. “Now tell me where it all is, and we’ll take it before it burns up.”

“We’re about to die and all you care about is treasure!?” Ace snapped. Seriously? The safety of their Pirate Fund had been the very last thing on his mind, behind even his own life.

“If you don’t get it, it’ll just go to waste.” Bluejam said, a flicker of charisma in his words. “So you’ll tell me, won’t you?”

Luffy’s anger was almost as hot as the flames around them, and Ace pulled himself out of his battle stance to stand as tall as he could. Even with his little brother’s magic shielding him from Bluejam’s weak attempt at charisma, he had to agree to do it. These pirates cared about gold more than anything else, even more than their own nakama. If he told them, they would leave and he could get Luffy out of here. Luffy seemed to sense his plan, though, because the rubber idiot just had to open his big mouth.

“Don’t be stupid! You and Sabo worked hard-”

“I’ll tell you.” he said firmly, speaking over Luffy.

“Ace!” Luffy blurted, not bothering to finish his previous sentence. “You and Sabo spent ages collecting that treasure!”

Ace clenched his jaw for a second at the thought of Sabo, home with his real family in High Town, watching the fire from a safe distance. Just like the two of them should be doing from the mountain. “Sabo will understand.” he said firmly. “Right now your-” he stopped, almost biting his tongue. His brothers didn’t like when he left himself you of things like this, and he needed Luffy to cooperate. “Our lives are more important!”

Luffy opened his mouth again, but a sharp glare got him to shut up long enough for Ace to detail where their treasure tree was, as well as what it looked like and where in the tree they’d hidden the loot. And then, when he stopped speaking, the man who’d been standing behind him grabbed under his arms and lifted him straight off the ground. On his left, Luffy was lifted up into the air as well.

“What’re you doing?” he yelled, struggling to land a blow on the man holding him. “I just told you where it is!”

“But you could be lying.” Bluejam said, and Ace had never hated a living person so much before that moment. “You’ll have to come with us.”

“Gimme a break!” he yelled, trying to appeal to the man’s sense of self-preservation. “If you do that, you won’t be able to get away! Go without us!”

“Don’t make me any angrier than I already am!” Bluejam roared, pulling out a gun and levelling his floating swords at Ace’s chest. Ace recoiled reflexively, eyes wide. He could survive getting cut and stabbed, but nothing on Mount Corvo had trained him for taking a bullet.

“I'm going to come back and have my revenge on these nobles, even if I have to use some kids' treasure to do it!” Bluejam spat, and Ace couldn’t argue that was a decent use of their accumulated treasure. Not as good as using it to get a pirate ship, but it could’ve been worse. “You 'brothers' should do the same.” the man sneered, and Ace scowled at him with bared teeth. Take revenge on Sabo for trying to protect them? Never. “They think they're special, and everyone else is trash!”

“Sabo doesn’t think like that!” Ace snapped, struggling anew.

“He's the same as them, you idiot!” Bluejam made a hand gesture, and one of his floating swords darted forward. The flat of the blade smacked against Ace’s cheek, and he only barely managed not to jolt with pain. Luffy cried out, his magic crackling across Ace’s skin, but Bluejam just kept talking, spewing vile lies about Sabo. Any other time, any other person speaking, Ace might’ve wondered if there was some truth to the words. But Bluejam was the reason Sabo was gone, the reason they were trapped in the Grey Terminal as it burnt to the ground. Bluejam was the type of pirate who gave them all a bad name, and Ace _hated_ him.

“Don’t say another word about Sabo!” he yelled, straining against the arms holding him. For the first time in his life, he could feel the thrum of magic under his skin. It wasn’t the gentle warmth Sabo had described, not even close, but Ace _knew_ that the fire burning in his bones was his magic. If only he could use it! Sabo made it sound so effortless, just focus the power inside and magic happens, but what magic could he _do_?!

“Yeah! Sabo just wanted to be free!” Luffy shouted, and the fire licking at the inside of Ace’s skin died as quickly as it had been ignited when Luffy _bit_ the man holding him. The rubber idiot was dashed against the ground, and sure he got his pipe up defensively but his captor was drawing a sword not a pipe or mace. The blade cleaved Luffy’s pipe neatly in two, and Ace screamed as his baby brother’s chest was carved open.

“I’m gonna kill you!” Luffy’s captor yelled, raising his sword to drive it through the little idiot’s heart, and a disjointed memory flashed before Ace’s eyes. Sabo, laughing as he tricked grown-ups into giving him what he wanted with just a bit of charisma magic. Ace’s hands curled into desperate fists as the sword lifted, and he _pulled_ on the flames of his magic. Anyone could use any magic, and now that he could actually sense his own energy he was going to put every damn ember of it into this.

“ **Don’t touch him!** ” he roared, magic ringing in his voice. Luffy’s words chimed with magic sometimes, though never intentionally, and as all the pirates but Bluejam fainted Ace wondered if his baby brother would be able to do the same thing once he was trained. The man holding him went down like Luffy in the river, and Ace burst free to stand with his pipe at the ready.

Luffy was crying, clutching where he’d been cut, and Bluejam’s face was quickly moving from shock to anger. “What have you done, you brat?!” he yelled, floating swords clattering to the ground as his boot connected with Ace’s ribs. Ace toppled back, the boot still planted firmly on his chest, and reached for his magic to get this fucker _off_ of him. Luffy was screaming, Bluejam was cursing, the flames were roaring, and in the middle of it all Ace felt cold.

There was a gun pointed at his head, point blank, and he’d poured all his magic into one spell. He was going to die here, his brains were going to be splattered on the burning trash heaps of the Grey Terminal, and that wasn’t even what sent an icy lance of fear through his heart. He couldn’t die, not yet, not in front of Luffy. He couldn’t die, and he wouldn’t.

“ **Get off me!** ” he yelled, pulling on what little remains of magic he had. It wasn’t enough, Bluejam didn’t waver even the slightest bit, but Ace gripped his pipe tight with both hands and slammed it against the man’s leg. He didn’t have any magical energy left, and he felt a little bit colder for it, but there was more than one type of energy in the body. He focused like Sabo had taught him to, and sure enough there were other sources of power. His body, his soul, his very life. That last one would do.

“I said, **GET OFF!!** ” his voice rang with more magic than he’d meant to use, and Bluejam’s eyes widened as he started to pull his foot away. And then the backside of a long-handled axe slammed into his ribs and he went staggering.

“Quit it, you sea brats!” Dadan yelled, and Ace scrambled to his feet. He felt stronger than ever, his entire body thrumming with energy. If this was what magic felt like, he could understand why Sabo was so eager for him to learn how to use it.

“What’re you guys doing here?” he snapped, shoving the giddiness down. He still had to beat the shit out of Bluejam.

\---

“Ace? Ace!”

He groaned, and swatted weakly at the hand slapping him. “Go ‘way.” he mumbled, trying to turn onto his side. He couldn’t, someone was holding him. Ace cracked an eye open, and immediately regretted it. It was bright, so bright his head hurt, and once his head started hurting he realized that the rest of him hurt too. His skin where the fire had burnt him, his throat from inhaling all that hot smoky air, the places Bluejam had cut him, and a deeper pain, like smouldering fire in the heart of his bones.

“Thank the gods.” Dadan sighed, that was definitely Dadan’s voice, and a hand smoothed over his forehead. “You stubborn, foolish, _reckless_ child. Do you know how dangerous that stunt was?”

What stunt? Ace frowned, and squinted one eye open. Dadan was leaning over him now, blocking out most of the light, but it was still really bright. “Huh?” his throat felt like sandpaper, and when Dadan held a cup of water to his mouth he drank without complaining.

“You burnt _years_ off of your life last night, you ungrateful brat.” Dadan rapped him sharply on the forehead with the bottom of the cup, and Ace groaned. The deep pain was creeping through his whole body now, making it painful even to breathe.

“Where- are we?” he rasped after a minute of near silence. He could hear animals, wind in the trees, but that only narrowed it down to the whole of Mount Corvo.

“Behind the house.” Dadan answered simply, letting him take another sip of water. “Didn’t want Luffy to see you looking half dead, so we had Magra and Pagos take a look at you first.”

Pagos was the only bandit whose affinity was medical magic, but why would Magra be involved? He was a Seer, the eagle eye of the gang, not anybody you'd want helping with bandages. Maybe bedside manner, but Ace had only just woken up so it couldn’t have been that. “Why Magra?” he asked, his throat still painful but no longer feeling quite so much like he’d swallowed hot coals.

Dadan whacked him with the water cup again. “Because you’re an idiot, that’s why.” she said. Ace shut his eyes. Everything hurt, and Luffy was surely burnt even worse since he didn’t have a well-trained fire affinity running through the blaze with him. But Luffy was alive, Luffy was inside and well enough to be worrying about him. That was good, he could focus on that.

“Who taught you how to See energies?” Dadan asked after a minute of silence.

“Sabo.” Ace answered automatically. It had only worked for the first time last night, but Sabo had taught him how to do it years ago, not long after that miserable failure with the book of affinity tester spells.

“Well, I’ll have to have a word with him later.” Dadan huffed. “Never do that again, brat.” her tone softened, and one bandaged hand ran over his cheek. “If Luffy lost you, he’d cry for days.”

Ace turned his head away, and willed himself not to cry. He could sense it now, when he focused. The bright curl of energy which was his life force was no longer identical to the energy of his soul. Last night the two curls had wound around each other like twin snakes of glowing, well, not gas but something flowy and floaty. The important thing was, they’d been identical in every way but colour, his soul a brilliant white-gold and his life force a white-blue.. Now his life force seemed less somehow, more blue around the edges.

A memory came to mind unbidden, and Ace let it wash over him. They’d been hanging out in the forest, Sabo trying to teach him how to See energies, and gotten sidetracked in the explanation into talking about the different colours. Most people’s energies were muddy, but if someone’s colour was colour-wheel clear then they had magic which was harmonious with their soul. Dim colours were a sign that their life force was waning, and a colour change meant someone had undergone a great, uh, whatever it was caterpillars did when they turned into butterflies. One of those.

Sabo had compared Ace’s colour that day to the golden sunlight which saturated the clearing they’d been lounging in. Ace wondered what his colour looked like now. Did it look tarnished, or just muddy? Yellow didn’t darken well.

“Do you know what your affinity is called, Ace?” Dadan asked. From the sound of it, she had yet to move from her spot at the edge of the bed. Ace shook his head minutely. He still hurt too much to do anything else.

“Conquering magic.” she said, and Ace opened his eyes slightly. The light no longer hurt, which he guessed was a good thing. Once his head stopped hurting, the rest of his body should follow, right? “It’s a stronger sort of charisma magic which can only be used by someone with an affinity for it, but it’s a one in a million affinity.”

Ace turned his head towards Dadan, and opted not to speak but simply grin. One in a million? Luffy would be so jealous.

“It’s also highly illegal.” Dadan said sternly, wagging a finger at him like either of them cared about the law. “If you’re caught commanding someone like you did to Bluejam last night, you’ll be imprisoned before Garp can do anything about it.”

Ace frowned, and looked away from Dadan again.

“Just, stick to charisma spells while you’re here, okay brat?” Dadan ruffled his hair, and Ace growled. Dadan laughed, and pulled him to his feet. “C’mon, I’m not carrying you, brat.” she placed her hand between his shoulder blades and gave him a gentle shove. “Walk your skinny ass inside and get Pagos to take a look at your throat.”

Ace nodded, and squared his shoulders. Luffy would be worried, so he had to look fine. Or as fine as one could look while limping and covered in bandages.


End file.
